In order to post a comment in one of the forum topics, you must log in or sign up. Your display name will appear next to your posts unless you check the Post Anonymously box. When writing a post, please follow our forum guidelines. If you come across a post that you would like us to review, use the Report Post button. Please note the opinions shared in the forums do not necessarily reflect the views of Dockwalk.

I’ve seen so many cliché stews join yachts only to leave twelve weeks later. These young women (girls) gleaming with joy, energy and a freshness that has the capacity to draw boys closer so they can determine whether she is worthy of their most effective one liner at the next Rybovich crew party.

For prowling deckhands a chance meeting with the newbie stew can lead to a telephone number exchange and a date with all the frills a girls dream about, like a fresh pair of jocks and an honorable mention on face book after the legendary wallet bump is used (the world’s oldest condom).

During their first weeks of employment new girls willingly bounce, dance and sing like MTV reality stars that have suddenly became famous.

Whenever we recruit a hot Barbie doll our laziest deckhand suddenly starts lifting heavy boxes and performing duties that he usually avoids like the plague. Drooling over the hot new girls curves and bumps becomes everyone’s favorite sport and topic for discussion, nevertheless the spark and energy these girls had at the start always seems to declines slowly.

Energizer bunny recruits de-energize and fail to deliver their resumes promise because they don't understand what real yachting is all about, it’s about serving the owners, guests and charter clients. The shorter hours of pre-season eventually disappear and morph into progressively longer work days that consume valuable weekend time, which prompts wiser crewmembers to adhere to unwritten curfews.

Knuckling down and paying attention to work runs second place against reality and as it completes with the dreamy temptations of shopping, socializing and wearing the latest Dolce & Gabanna sunglasses and trendsetting clothes.

These teenage and twenty something ladies very quickly get a taste for expensive delights normally beyond their well manicured fingers.

Behind closed doors these babes suffer terrible anxiety whilst lamenting their weeks of binge shopping and learn how join the other shopaholics in the return cues at random malls spread across South Florida.

A majority of girls do continue to party and drift through a cycle of binge shopping, crash diets, body cleanses, spa treatments and late nights out chasing buff lads, that occasionally leads to the exchange of body fluids with boys and girls, whilst lingering within the shadows of trendy nightclubs or the sanctity of South Florida’s finest motels and vacant guest cabins.

They say the first thing a good stewardess does is walk back to her boat and there is nothing more splendid that watching a ruffled stew make the walk of shame back onto the boat, whilst the deck crew chamois the rain scum from the topcoat, cap rails and windows.

A stewardess that makes the walk of shame usually spends her day avoiding ridicule from her crewmates and begins to understand there are boundaries which require attention. A promiscuous reputation in yachting is something that never goes away it becomes an urban legend or myth that MAKES YOU THAT GIRL.

An acceptable margin of frolicking is healthy and very wise, but the moment a persons name becomes synonymous with burning the candle at both ends, it gains the unwelcome attention of leading crew members and closed door meeting that are real come to Jesus moments that enable people to confess to their sins and change up a few gears and grab a touch of reality before being sent down the gang plank.

With new perspectives the A typical newbie begins her service apprenticeship and which allows her to become at one with all things Milie and progress toward ninja napkin folding, the etiquette of silver service and silent housekeeping. No more iPod and no more 30 minute tea breaks its head down ass up.

When the impending departure for Europe looms darkly overhead everyone’s heads and the silent fears and rumors of crossings past become crew mess stories. The science of weather and complexity of passage plans evades the comprehension of our naïve stew and a mild form of panic regularly disturbs her sleep.

On the day of departure the crew morale is normally very high and signals time for misunderstood excitement to grip everyone that has never crossed the pond. The first days are met with silver seas, cloudless skies and a cycle of watches, interior duties, sunbathing, nighttime movies and twelve hours of sleep.

The chef’s expertise destroys diets, adds pounds and requires cellulite cream to be applied around the upper legs and buttocks as snug uniforms begin to split at the seems. With a change in weather a new direction for the yacht and the crew results in rolling swells and uneasy moments at the dinner table as people’s eyes roll around and mouths purse tightly as they try to prevent projectile vomit from escaping.

Restless nights and changing time zones every forty eight hours confuse the stewardesses internal cycle and unwelcome menstrual cramps now pile onto the nauseous sensation seasickness delivers. Time now appears to stand still and the serious side of a maritime career challenges the dreamy image yachting was meant to deliver.

Upon arrival the calmness of the port miraculously negates the dizziness of seasickness.

This welcome change charges the stewardess with a viva and energy that seem impossible to recover. Some ten days after arrival the owner arrives with his wife and six guests. The season is now here and the challenges of long days and zero time off take hold. At this stage the chances of the new girl making through the season are 100%, but the chances of her completing a follow up season with this yacht a 50/50, because endless hours of work, painful feet, and finger tips contribute to a physical and mental decline that has beaten down strong suitors in the past.

Tired and worn the stewardess begins to note which boys are asleep, working and on break. Comparing her day to everyone else is an emotional journey because it seems she is now the only one doing 6am to 11pm with a one hour break roster that enables her to sneak in a power nap. The simplest of task are now difficult to perform with a smile and any criticism for the Chief Stew ends is uncontrolled tears.

The world of the newbie stewardess has now come full circle and the cliché moment arrives when she resigns precisely when the season ends. Whether she fly’s home or jumps on another boat is unknown. I wish her luck and just hope that wherever she goes a more mature outlook is taken.

Probably just a heads up, warning and a reality check for all those new stews out there looking for their first berth on a boat. Often it helps to have a healthy grasp on the realities of a job before you get in it. He's given several clues which if read correctly can help a stew mentally prepare for the challenges ahead, and when one is mentally prepared, reality isn't so difficult to take and increases the odds of the career going beyond the 12 week cycle.

Henning once again you have nailed it.
The whole point of this sarcastic, yet realistic synopsis of the cliché stewardess in a WARNING and WAKE UP Call for naïve young women that land their first job onboard a yacht.

Its a decent observation. Many young people and young stewardess's in particular are simply looking for a job in the sun. Nice enough people ,but never a good motivation for working as a crew. These young crew soon realize that a crew job has endless hours with stressful living conditions that restrict your freedom.
Always been a huge crew churn in the introductory positions on yachts.. I can think of years in which Ive gone thru three young stewardess's in one month . With scenarios like....... The new stewardess, two weeks into the job , does a no show at morning coffee time ,the telephone rings, new stewardess tells me she is feeling ill and spending the day at a friends house.... It all ends in tears....another one bites the dust.
A good tip for young crew doing their first season is to be diligent and maintain discipline when the yacht is berthed at the marina.

Henning once again you have nailed it.
The whole point of this sarcastic, yet realistic synopsis of the cliché stewardess in a WARNING and WAKE UP Call for naïve young women that land their first job onboard a yacht.

I suspect the anonymous respondents were likely those it was written to help.... It's kinda hard to fathom what a tough way to make a living it really is until you've jumped in the deep end.

Am I the only one who thinks this whole thing is a little sexist? Can't all the same things be said for newbie deckhands as well? Or is it just we girls who are disillusioned, flighty and shallow? The walk of shame for a girl, I guess, is a walk of victory for a guy. If the deckhand is busy hard at work first thing in the morning when the girl is walking back to the boat, then who did she just sleep with?
Yes, young people can be immature but this extends to both boys and girls - not just the stewardess.

Am I the only one who thinks this whole thing is a little sexist? Can't all the same things be said for newbie deckhands as well? Or is it just we girls who are disillusioned, flighty and shallow?.

It is quite possible that the same might apply to new deckhands but it would appear that the author of the thread has noticed that this is quite often the case with new stewardesses and was writing it as a warning not as an attack on women. Would you have asked the same question (in reverse) if the original post
had been written about a new deckhand? I doubt it.

Am I the only one who thinks this whole thing is a little sexist? Can't all the same things be said for newbie deckhands as well? Or is it just we girls who are disillusioned, flighty and shallow? The walk of shame for a girl, I guess, is a walk of victory for a guy. If the deckhand is busy hard at work first thing in the morning when the girl is walking back to the boat, then who did she just sleep with?
Yes, young people can be immature but this extends to both boys and girls - not just the stewardess.

Everything you have said is quite correct. It isn't fair or right, but it is accurate, that's just the way our society is, and if you think western society is bad for it, mid-eastern society is even worse. For what it's worth, lots of novice boy deckies can't hack it either, and they soon find that they were quite misplaced in their "walk of victory" when they get tasked with some obnoxious duty for hanging others to cover the job they were supposed to be doing. The turn over of greenhorns is pretty much equal between the sexes actually. Once people find out that it is a tough lifestyle, most can't hack it. The deckie who is hard at work when the new deckie or stew comes in from their night out is the one who already figured that out, the next one they walk by is the stew inside already cleaning.

However, sexism is a double edged sword. None of what was written was written of ill intent or bent to misogyny, quite the opposite in fact. We try to harbor and protect the girls in our industry because we know how miserable it would be without them. If I wanted to always be on a boatload of guys, I would have stayed commercial. It sure paid better and gave me a better schedule and a lot less headaches. You didn't see the story written for male deckies, because we don't really give a rats a$$ if they sink or swim. They're dime a dozen and can figure it out on their own or not, no one really cares. So take it as a compliment when someone takes the time to educate the girls, it's because we like them and are trying to even the playing field for them that society has set askew.

Slow in Australia ....Slow here to, 4 knots . Big waves , SMASH !! Cant see the buggers and steer around them because the stb windscreen wiper rubber blade is dried out and sorta smudges, smears the view. Boats....always something to fix...SMASH..... And the observation about young girls doing their first crew season is not sexist, its just an observation. Perhaps this observation is only thru my male eyes. Perhaps I make a poor choice when hiring girls. When I interview a young guy and ask THE QUESTION...Why do you want to work on boats ? and get the reply... "I Need some professional experience, more seatime and some money so I can sit for my captains ticket" I think PERFECT, sounds like my kinda crew !! When I ask this same question to a young girl I get all kinds of answers ....So I can Travel...to work in the sunshine.... What is a good answer ???? Another observation is that Young guys seem to quickly build up a network of shipmates, a knowledge, stress relief ,support network. Go to any yachty pub after work for a beer and you will see heaps of young guys talking work, MCA tickets, Awlgrip and boats. Not so easy for girls to build this support network of other young girls doing their first season. There are few girls working the yachts, perhaps out numbered ten to one . I only have one stewardess and Ive never seen my young stewardess hanging out with a gang of boat girls talking shop...never . I do see that she has build up a social network of eager yachty boys looking for dinner dates . A busy social life can take your eye off the task at hand and interfere with your work life.. Just an observation and of course plenty of young guys don't keep thier eye on the ball and make it thru their first season.

Flighty is Flighty.... in other words, a crew member that regularly does the walk of shame home to find EVERYbody else working away should second guess why they have their job (if they even have one afterwards). There is nothing worse than having to find another employee just 3 months after hiring. Conversely there is nothing better than a good team that stay together and relies on each other.
In reply to the sexists comment, as a female skipper, I am continually developing my viewpoints around the roles and behaviors that men and women have on the boats. Ultimately boats are just a condensed version of the real world where there IS a double standard. However, remember the "fresh meat" on a boat (man or woman) will always get talked about. Get over it! If you are embarrassed by the image that people perceive then put stop updating your facebook page on your iPhone and either get back to work or get out of this fish-bowl life we live in. I've seen plenty of Captains chamois and chief stew clean toilets. If you want respect then worry about the standard you set for yourself and your behavior will not reflect the standard set by others.
And don't worry ladies......next weeks' article will be about somebody else's rants and raves slamming captain's hiring-to-date and new young male deckhands drooling over the hot new girls and not getting any work done.

Ha ha .... and you're obviously that pig ugly engo who looks on at all these young crew enjoying themselves and resents the fact that the new stew doesn't look at him twice. Who then scurries into his cabin and tries to relieve those feelings of rejection by writing these posts and sits back beaming with pride at what he thinks is a literary masterpiece when in-fact it is poorly written pointless drivel.
In every business there are new naive people... get over it.

I believe 100% in Stewardesses being totally informed when they join the industry. In many years on yachts, I saw too many girls being disillusioned after entering the industry based on lies and dreams and illusions.
Therefore, I think they should PREPARE themselves properly and do more than just the required STCW course - they should do one of the excellent Introductory Stewardess Courses offered in many countries around the world - USA, UK, South Africa, Australia, France. They should also do a Power Boat Level II and maybe even a Deck Hand course or two to make them MORE than just a pretty little Stewardess walking the docks and trolling the bars in Antibes of Fort Lauderdale.
They would be valuable, professional crew members who invested in their future and they will be much more prepared for the good AND THE BAD of a career on yachts.

Great artical,Don't really understand what your point was, but well written, Stews...got to love em, especially the young one's made from that same cookie cutter.They party like rock stars, dress like porn stars and end up on the same heap at the end of the day, stewardess melt down.

Antipodean, I think you hit the nail on the head & have the makings to pen a book. Really, no BS. There are so many people in general that I've seen come in & go out of yachting w/ relatively short time in between. It comes down to leadership on so many levels or at least two. A proper interview that asks the right questions but one who also lays it out/ w/ respect to the work load& what that crewmembers' general responsibility is. Having a strong department head who manages & leads by example is paramount. I gotta agree w/ you on so many levels of your vent there. Keep it up, let's hear some other insights you have. I'm actually going to save this webpage! It sounds like you've been around for a few "crossings" All the best & keep writing.

In response to Antipodean's post - As a woman I find your post very tasteless indeed. I see what your point is and you make an effort to illustrate the hardships of yacht work by mentioning the long, restless work hours, the crossing etc, but for goodness sake, is it really neccessary to make these crazy generalizations about stews singing like MTV stars, being primiscuous and referring to stews as "barbie dolls". You seem to speak like you are a psychologist in the field of the stew's internal workings. I would like to see how you came up with the following quote (which you seem to think reflects new stews) - "as it completes with the dreamy temptations of shopping, socializing and wearing the latest Dolce & Gabanna sunglasses and trendsetting clothes". You clearly put girls in a box of wanting only material possessions. It is a ludicrous assumption and from my experience most stews are either in the industry to make a long-term career of it or otherwise in it to make some good money before carrying on with traveling or their relavant career. The money is good and a lot of people use it as a stepping stone and not as a means to feel like a MTV star.

How, may I ask, did you find that the majority of new girls fall into the following category? Quoting you, "A majority of girls do continue to party and drift through a cycle of binge shopping, crash diets, body cleanses, spa treatments and late nights out chasing buff lads, that occasionally leads to the exchange of body fluids with boys and girls, whilst lingering within the shadows of trendy nightclubs or the sanctity of South Florida’s finest motels and vacant guest cabins"

Most girls I have come accross are in fact mature and driven people and yes, often this industry is too hectic and strenuous for them, but it certainly does not mean that they are lacking a mature outlook, as you so generously state at the end of your written piece.

There are many factors that lead to a high stew turnover. It is not merely the lifestyle, but also the leadership they are put under. A bitchy chief stew, for instance, effects the lives of stews immensely, which is why, in my opinion, many stews choose to leave and not subject themselves to such leadership. My point is that there are many other factors determining the period of a stew's employment. I would do a little bit more research and I would also try and look at a wider variety of stew scenarios before classifying newbies into such a fickle and flimsy category.

can't this essay be based on an individual? yes girls messed up and yes boys are no better.. so wouldn't you say that its an individual who made poor choices in life? an inexperienced person will definately fall. and once they fall you can't say if that person didnt learn or did learn those lessons. its unfair to say girls are whores and dont care about their work. its unfair to say boys are sluts too... haha well i say a person is a person and there's a rotten apple in every box. to each their own. if they fall through the cracks they are not meant to be here. if they care about themselves and their career then they shall move on. delusion of grandure is rellevent to everyone.

however ive never been on a boat but this gives me a sampling of what kind of people to expect there; very diligent workers who are passionate about sailing, and those that have never been and was only trying it out. I'm definately going to be diligent. its a whole new world im trying to know about. it's more interesting each day reading these bulletins.

I'm sure Deb is posting on this thread somewhere...and if it matters it's not just new stews...we had a chief stew that was "hot" to some and she went from yacht to yacht for no more than 2-3 months each...from SA, blonde like barbie with a voice that could peel paint...after 3-4 years she still couldn't deal with it.
She had worked for a Russian for 3 years as a bed toy and 3rd stew and didn't really have to do anything...so my point is it really doesn't matter whether they are fresh on the boat or just off another boat it's the industry and it's not as easy as people think.

Hey Antipodean, you didn't really fall for that "period" story did you. To all the other anonymous wannabes asking how Antipodean can make these assertions the answer is simple, it's observation. I could go on & on but most of it has already been said & yes the guys are a problem as well.

The illiterate, ill-thought out, narrow minded, neanderthal comments which are regularly posted on this site never fail to surprise me. Yachting in so many respects lags behind every other industry I know in its outdated practices and attitudes. Grow up guys, drag yourselves into the 21st century, or do us all a favour and crawl back into your caves and let the rest of us get on with modernising the industry.

Naturally the "Neanderthal " observation comes from an Anonymous poster !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Antipodeans comment may be harsh , but Ive seen it happen many times. Perhaps instead of condemning observations as narrow minded, you should pass on some advice to first year stewardess's on how to avoid the common pitfalls and form a better crew team.